The Hired Girl(125)

While my mind was working out the best way to escape, my heart was telling me another story. The story was that somehow David would know I meant to leave and stop me. It was crazy, I know that now, but I wanted it so much that I believed it. It seemed impossible that David didn’t love me.

I descended the stairs slowly, pausing to listen every few steps. I imagined David coming out of his room. His eyes would look wild and tormented, because he wouldn’t have slept, either. He would grasp my hand and lead me back to his room, where we could shut the door and talk in whispers. He would confess to me that he did love me, but that he’d been afraid to say so before his family, because I was a shiksa. I would forgive him; he would kiss me, and we would run away to Paris.

I imagined it all. I strained to hear his footfalls on the stairs. I’d reached the first floor. My hand was on the newel post — and I heard the stairs creak.

“Janet!”

My heart leaped. And then it plummeted, because the voice wasn’t David’s. It was Malka’s voice, and Malka was hobbling down the stairs; Malka in her flannel wrapper and embroidered shawl. “I knew it,” she croaked. “I said to myself: She’ll run away. She’s a headstrong girl; she’ll run out during the night, and we’ll never set eyes on her again. I kept watch,” she added gruffly and proudly. “I’ve been sitting up in bed, listening. There’s a crick in my neck that won’t go away in a hurry.”

I started to say, “I’m leaving —” but she clamped her bony arm around me.

“No, you’re not. You’re going to come downstairs and let me make you a cup of coffee. And then you’re going to listen to me, because you’re a good girl.”

I’d cried all night. I’d thought I had no more tears to shed. But there was something about her calling me a good girl that started me howling again. She dragged me down to the kitchen, and I couldn’t shake her off, because she was clinging to me, smelling of camphor and onions and old age. My eyes were blind with tears, and I was afraid of treading on her bunion.

She sat me down at the kitchen table. She lifted Thomashefsky and plunked him down on my lap. Of course he wouldn’t stay. She made coffee — I watched dully — and she put in cream and sugar with a lavish hand: too much cream and sugar, which is what I like. I didn’t know she’d noticed how I take my coffee. She made me toast, sopping with butter and gritty with cinnamon and sugar: cinnamon toast, the Rosenbachs’ cure-all. “Now, you eat that,” she commanded.

I didn’t think I could. Heroines in books don’t eat when their hearts are broken. They pine away. But my stomach gave an agonized rumble, and I realized I was ravenous. I ate, and it was good. I drank two cups of coffee, one after another. Crying always makes me thirsty.

“Now what?” Malka said, after I’d finished a third slice of toast. “Have you given up on running away?”

That nettled me, because I hadn’t. “I won’t be sent back home, and I can’t stay here. Mrs. Rosenbach doesn’t like me. And David —”

“That good-for-nothing!” spat Malka, and she said a Yiddish word I’ve never heard before. I don’t know what it was, but you could tell from the sound that it was really bad. My anger leaped up. “Don’t you dare say that about David!”

Malka leaned across the table and poured herself a cup of coffee. “He’s a young fool, that’s what he is. And you’re another. Even if you weren’t a shiksa, it wouldn’t be right. He won’t be ready for marriage for another ten years, not that one. Fifteen, even. What do you want with him?”

“I love him.”

Malka rolled her eyes. “Love! You think it lasts, but it doesn’t. You forget about him, you hear me? You’ve got to think of the future.”

“I am thinking of the future. I tell you, I won’t be sent home —”

Malka made an impatient gesture with her hands. “Nobody’s going to send you home. There was talk about it, yes, but my little Moritz has another idea.” She leaned across the table, her witchlike eyes gleaming. “I talked to him while you were having your bath. He wants to send you to that fancy school he’s opening next year. He says if you’re only fourteen, you’re even smarter than he thought you were. You’re smart enough to do well, and they need Gentiles. The school’s meant to be half and half, but they’re short of Gentiles.”

She tapped her spoon against the table, punctuating her speech. “You’ll work for Anna another year. You’re good with Oskar. Once David’s out of the country, you’ll come back here every week; you’ll be our Shabbos goy. When the school opens, Moritz will see that you receive a scholarship. You’ll get your education, just as your mother wanted. You can grow up to be anything you want — not that there’s any shame in being a hired girl.” She glanced around the kitchen as if reviewing all the things we’ve cleaned together. “You’ve done a good job here. You talk back, and you oversleep, and you shouldn’t kiss the master’s son. But still. You’re a fine girl, and you’ve earned your way.”